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At the tender age of 19, XO has begun a budding career as a multi-faceted producer, songwriter, and DJ out of the UK. His sound, forward; his lyrics, relateable; vibes, on point. It’s exactly what I’ve come to expect out of the UK at the moment, illustrious coupled basslines with diverse percussive arrangements that accentuate the featured vocalist. For his debut EP, “Through The Night,” a three track feature takes place with a credible range of tunes from sultry sub-soul to to hustling UK garage that is reassuring for his Freshmen release. We got the chance to exchange words with XO after “Through The Night” was released on December 1st where his affinity for Justin Timberlake comes to life, his highlights from the year as a newcomer are revealed, and some possible projects for 2015 divulged.. dig in! Continue Reading

It’s pretty safe to say that Dirtybird is on a tear, and we were lucky enough to reserve a sit down with the first lady over at their camp, none other than J.Phlip. Check out our conversation with this crate-digging crowd pleaser, as we cover everything from her debut tour as a headliner, to her snacks of choice…

The homie Justin Jay has been on the underground scene for years now, and he’s just entered his senior year of college. The classically trained producer explains the balance of work and school in this rad lil mini-documentary filmed in Los Angeles. Get to know the Dirtybird Records prodigy a little bit better in this short but informative vid from NHQ.

To get you ready for their headline show tomorrow night 9/12 in Los Angeles @ Exchange, we caught up with the LA-based duo Oliver, who’s techno driven yet disco spirited sound has catapulted them to wide spread support and made them a household name along the festival circuit.

GDD: Your Light Years Away EP just dropped this week on Fool’s Gold. Both ‘Light Years Away’ and ‘Fast Forward’ boast massive techno driven bass lines that reconcile with disco and funk chords and vocals throughout. What was the inspiration behind the 2 tracks?

OLIVER: If I remember correctly, Vaughn had the idea for the main bassline in Light Years Away and we just started building the track around that. We wrote the section that ended up becoming the bridge on piano and the lyric/melody with our friend Ryland. A lot of the time we aren’t really sure what parts are going to end up in the finished song so we like to try a bunch of ideas and see what sticks.

For Fast Forward, we had that little vocal part from some other song that ended up not going anywhere. We always liked the idea and actually tried to use it a couple times but it never went anywhere. This is a great example of having a vocal idea or song title and letting that dictate the direction of the track. We actually used the iPad a bunch on this song. And the final bassline that you hear was like one of 10 that we ended up settling on minutes before having to hand the song in.

GDD: Your production has evolved over the past few years, as you guys have played bigger shows and festivals? Has that had any effect on the productions?How would you describe what makes it an “Oliver” track?

OLIVER: We try our best to play out tracks that will translate well to crowds while at the same time be something we can stand behind. I think that has become something that is a motivator in the studio, to make songs that can translate in a live setting but not sound like everybody else. I think these two tracks are prime examples of us just having come off the road and wanting to have something original to play.

GDD: You’ve become really close with Destructo and the HARD family, both in the studio and on stage… how did that all come to be?

OLIVER: We work with a company called Pulse who manages us and Gary is a close friend of the Pulse team. That’s how we all met and started to collaborate on music in the studio.

GDD: This Friday you guys play Exchange in downtown Los Angeles. What’s your favorite thing about performing in LA and are you excited for such a big headline show?

OLIVER: Yeah! It’s gonna be a fun one. Definitely feels good having all our friends and team there who have been so supportive since day one. We are really excited to have some new material out and also working on a lot more of it. Hopefully we will be able to test out some demos on the night.

OLIVER: Oh man, I’m pretty sure every birthday of mine ends in embarrassment. I’m pretty sure we’ve all had those birthdays where people wont stop buying you shots. I mean, it would be rude not to take them right? Haha

Great tracks are often swept under the rug, dismissed, and forgotten. It seems that now more than ever, there are heaps of tracks that are given a second chance after being scooped up by bigger labels. We caught up with Amtrac, who is having his 2012 hit ‘Those Days’ re-released on the legendary Toolroom imprint.

Welcome back to another edition of the Quick-hitter! We’ve been seeing a lot of UK dj/producer Vanilla Ace here in the States this summer, and wanted to catch up with him amidst his US tour and headlining Afternoon Delight this Sunday @ The Standard Hotel rooftop in downtown LA… we’ll keep this short and sweet!

GDD: Vanilla Ace! You’ve been on a huge US summer tour, most notable just playing HARD Summer and Splash House… whats been some of your favorite shows on the tour so far?VA: All the shows have been great so far, HARD and Splash house were fun and messy! I also had a great time playing Bardot in Miami and Audio in San Francisco.

GDD: You’ve been hard at work in the studio w/ remixes for Moon Boots, Destructo, and originals with Sharam Jey, Adam Banks and Lora… what else do you have in the pipeline that you can hint us about?VA: I have two original releases on the way, ‘What you need’ single on Incorrect and the in demand ‘I’m hot’ EP on LouLou players. Both are out in the next few weeks.

GDD: Speaking of, your production is known in the “gangster house” category… whats one thing you do in the studio thats a signature to make it Vanilla Ace?VA: Only some of the music I make is ‘G-House’, the Moon Boots remix I just did with Barber is definitely more on the proper ‘deep house’ vibe. But to answer the question a signature Vanilla Ace production usually has a killer bass line and spooky/unusual synths/pads.

GDD: You play the “Afternoon Delight” @ The Standard Hotel rooftop this Sunday… whats your favorite thing about playing in LA? And are you afraid of heights?VA: I’m not afraid of heights but you wouldn’t catch me bungee jumping or sky diving anytime soon! I love LA, one of my favourite places in the world.

Sultan of Summer. Dance Music’s Jimmy Buffett. Mayor of Vibestown. Whatever you wanna call Viceroy, it’s clear that he has home field advantage at any summertime pool party, and Splash House in Palm Springs is the homecoming game. Round 2 of this summer’s poolside soiree is coming up quick (August 8th-10th), so we wanted to check in with our pal Viceroy in a little different way — with the Hawaiian shirt honcho responding to our inquiries only in the form of GIFs.

To get you hyped for Claude Vonstroke’s CALIFUTURE release party tomorrow @ Exchange LA, our very own BONES caught up with his special guest for the night and our long time friend Doorly. The UK to LA transplant has been on a warpath of house music production, and playing shows across the globe all summer long….

D: Just landed this morning, not slept in my own bed since May so its AMAZING to be back home for a few weeks! Having an incredible summer so far though, my new party at Pacha on Mondays is storming the island, we’ve had some mental line ups with the likes of Derrick Carter, Groove Armada, Giorgio Moroder, Basement Jaxx, Green Velvet, Shadow Child, Kenny dope to name a few passing through. Also i’ve been running a series of after hours parties at the legendary Pikes hotel, where they famously filmed wahm’s “Club Tropicana” Last week myself, Jesse Rose & Oliver $ did a back to back session and Duane harden popped up and sang along with us : )

Collaboration wise its also been a standout summer for me as well, my new collab with Cajmere just came out on his label Cajual alongside an full EP from me. I’m also polishing up more collaborations with DJ Pierre, Harry Choo Choo Romero and Switch (Featuring a spoken word vocal from Idris Elba!) And my latest record with Shadow Child “Piano Weapon” is finally about to drop!

GDD: Speaking of the studio, you’ve been on a warpath of production lately… what drove you to jump back into house music? What do you think stands out the most in your production?

D: I’ve always Made and Played house music since i started over 15 years ago its just for the couple of years that i toyed with bass music, those (Especially in america) were my biggest records so everybody assumed that i was a dubstep DJ no matter how hard i tried to convince the world otherwise. I just got to a point where i was not enjoying my gigs becuase the music being played around me was just getting more and more aggressive so 2 years ago i just had to make a conscious effort to just not play any more of those shows or make any more of that music and just solely make music i was 100 percent into again. There was a tricky year or so there becuase i was turning down 90 percent of the gigs i was being offered while i got the next wave of music out there but im so glad that i stuck to my guns because its all coming together very nicely now and i’ve never been so comfortable with my sound, i’ve definitely found my groove again.

With my productions, i’m very conscious of onto a bandwagon of whats hot right now (e.g the UK garage thing or “Deep House”) becuase i accidentally made that mistake once. My aim is to make tracks that sound like they were made 10 years ago, lots of funk but still with bass mentality to them and always for the dancefloor.

GDD: Some people might not know this, but are surgical with your DJ sets. With all the tricks you perform, do you plan out what you’re going to play for each set? Or do you just go upt here and have fun?

D: I never plan anything, i hope it shows but when i’m up there i’m having a blast myself experimenting with stuff all the time, i hate to go in with a plan because that way i’d end up playing the same set all the time and with an attention span as short as mine i would definitely look visibly bored up there! Obviously i put a lot of prep in before my sets making edits and stuff, and pioneer’s Rekordbox is absolutely my best mate these days!

GDD: You’re gearing up to play with the Dirtybird bossman Claude Vonstroke, whom you did a remix for on his recent single “The Clapping Track.” How’d that come to be and can we expect more from you forthcoming on Dirtybird?

D: It was a huge honour to be a part of that album remix package amongst some ridiculously good company, i was a massive fan of the album anyway and clapping track was my favourite track so when Barclay asked me to do it of course i nearly snapped his hand off! I’m really proud of how that came out and its still one of the biggest crowd winners in my sets.

And as for forthcoming stuff with Dirtybird, yeah 100 percent, the whole crew, DJs and Behind the scenes at Dirtybird are like a family to me so theres definitely more coming, I cant say too much right now you will be hearing something very fun from me on Dirtybird very soon : )

GDD: What do you like most about playing in LA? If this is your first time playing @ Exchange, what are you looking forward to most?

D: L.A is my home town now so i always manage to bring a huge crew with me, its great to DJ surrounded by all of your mates and then we usually end up having a spectacular afterparty at my place after as well, as the GDD crew can testify to! I’ve never actually played at Exchange before in all my years of coming here and i must have been over 100 times to watch my friends play and party there so i’m very very excited about this one, i genuinely feel like this could be one of my Biggest L.A shows to date so i’m most definitely going to Bring it!

Thanks to Barclay for asking me to come and support him on this and see you there Bone dogg!

This Monday will see the release of the highly anticipated debut album from longtime GDD™ favorites and Techno/Electro mavens, Mumbai Science, on Lektroluv Records. The Belgian duo follow up years of quality releases like “Ancova,” “Gold,” and “Impact” with eleven new tracks under the guise of Deja Vu, staying true to their initial inspirations while allowing the lenient album format to let them color outside the lines a bit.

In advance of the record release next week, the guys have answered a few questions about Deja Vu and also kindly given us first listen on their slamming collaboration with Mixhell which definitely feels like a refreshing throwback to the late 2000s with a well-executed, converging rock meets electro vibe. Listen to “Vegas” and get some insight on the new album below.